AIBU To Think That The Chalet School Matron Would Be In Prison Nowadays

[TheShellBeach]

..........................for giving unprescribed sedatives to the girls so frequently.

(lighthearted) (in case a million people tell me that IABU)

The Chalet School Matron was forever doling out sedatives to the girls, without even asking Jack Maynard to prescribe them first.
Shocking stuff. Nowadays, she would be jailed and struck off the NMC Register.

The other thing I found funny was that Robin was a "baby". She was 6! She didn't need to be carried around like a toddler!

Sorry forgot the "The".

IIRC Philippa’s polio happens between books.

So there’s references to her having had polio and come through it, but no actual narrative around her being ill. Which would be more dramatic than the descriptions of all those plays and evening entertainments, but hey ho.

Joey's attitude to the Robin was nauseating in every way. I do wonder what EBD was thinking of when she wrote some of that stuff!

Yes I was always baffled as to why Phil's polio happened between books - it would have been such an obvious dramatic chapter. Whereas in fact it's just a bit meh.

Phil’s illness (polio) would make a good theme for a fill in.

Having quickly scanned the first two books, I am wondering where all the good stuff happens e.g. pink worms! Seems quite dull so far.

They are very very dull right up to the point they become completely bonkers before reverting to being very very dull again. I think it’s the contrast that makes them so addictive to some people (kicks box of treasured chalet school books further under bed, looks shifty eyed).

Aw the second one is a real gem. Those lovely Christmas scenes in Innsbruck 😍

If you didn't enjoy that, the series might not be for you.

Actually, scratch that. The third one is Princess, right? You'll find that more lively. 😆

The thing that gets me is that it’s the equivalent of William and Kate dropping Charlotte off on her own at a random foreign boarding school and cheerfully waving goodbye. I’m pretty sure that even in the 30s, princesses had a security team? Also, were there no suitable schools in Belsornia?

During WWII, some naice folks with country houses took in children of London friends or advertised for suitable paying guests rather than take on Cockney refugees with lice and bad habits. Angela Thirkell describes this in her wartime novels.

That's a good question. I don't think there was much security for Royals the.n I imagine they could travel.incognito. Remember no TV. Most people probably didn't know what they looked like or where they were going on a given day.

Evil Uncle Cosimo!

I’m pretty sure that even in the 30s, princesses had a security team?

But where would be the fun / potential for Joey to stage a dramatic mountain rescue in that? 🤣

I think a security team was not that unusual as that's why Elisaveta didn't question having a bodyguard. I guess it was part of her being incognito though?

To be fair fiction/TV abounds with people who meet someone that they don't realise is a real life prince/princess so I don't think EBD is alone in the bonkersness

Just found this excellent version of the cover of Joey goes to the Overland. How the fuck couldn't she just get up from this tiny case she dramatically collapses into??
(This is also the book where Charles and Mike put 'blacking' all over themselves and it starts to choke their pores 😳)

With Elisaveta going to the Chalet School rather than a school in Belsornia, wasn’t part of the reasoning that they wanted Elisaveta to be anonymous and away from the pressures of being a princess for a while?

She presumably wouldn’t have much chance at anonymity if she’d been sent to a school in Belsornia. Too much of a likelihood that she’d be recognised from official portraits or newspaper photographs.

But she’s not going to be as recognisable to people from another country.

Aren’t the triplets supposed to be 10 or 11 in Joey Goes to the Oberland? They look like pre-schoolers on that book cover!

Like tiny identikit Shirley Temples! And the Robin is distinctly bosomy! Perhaps, like ‘big’ Joan Baker, she should have been referred to as ‘big Robin Humphries’…

The best example of this is in Exile, where Jack and Gottfried literally carry Robin on foot over the Alps for about a week. At this point in the series she is 14. She is only put down and forced to walk so that they can carry Bill instead, who has a sore ankle (gained, I think, by carrying 12-y-o Daisy up a mountain tunnel). I cannot imagine DH carrying a 14-y-o, even a short one, for more than about 5 minutes in an emergency and certainly not when there’s nothing actually wrong with her!

Jack is a fine, strapping man though 😉

Yeah, maybe he’s just showing off his biceps to an admiring Joey by carting the Robin around unnecessarily? After all, he’s fairly newly her ‘solid lump of comfort’!

In the book, it's a tea-chest she falls into. They were made of wood, and looked like this. I can quite see her getting stuck in one. www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=2ahUKEwjXkLrvm9T7AhWBWcAKHcYtBkkQ1bUFegQIHxAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fb%2FTea-Chest-in-Antique-Wooden-Boxes%2F37943%2Fbn_7022904536&usg=AOvVaw1quokV-Eza5eHbcEipDuqQ

I do think it's funnier to imagine her in a shallow cardboard box though

Oh, the Xmas stuff didn't appeal, no.

I will continue on in hopes of pink worms and exploding trains!